Himalaya

Pumori , October 25 2018

The Romanian trio made up of alpinists Romeo Popa, Zsolt Torok and Teofil Vlad has opened a new route on the South East wall of the Pumori, the iconic 7161 meter peak that overlooks the Everest Circus.

new route – pumori SE ( Romica Popa, Zsolt Torok and Teofil Vlad )

The new route, very cool for logic and sustained difficulty, is mainly on ice with some mixed climbing difficult to protect; it run for 1100 meters, reaching the summit ridge at 6700. 5 necessary bivouacs, three of which on the wall and the last two on the ridge; a day of rest the first, then the second day the final attack, which occurred facing winds up to 100 kmh.

The descent took place 1000 meters of rappelling along the west wall. The difficulty has been classified as AI 4, R (the degree should be in Romanian system, indicates a medium difficulty like D type , French reference ).

pumori summit ( Romica Popa, Zsolt Torok and Teofil Vlad )

Lunag Ri , October 28 – 2018

David Lama has realized the dream, long pursued, to climb the Lunag Ri (6905 meters), and he did it alone: after the famous 2 attempts in duo with Conrad Anker, the last of which ended with a dramatic retreat following a heart attack that affected Conrad. For now, we do not know the details of the climb, which theoretically should be the completion of previous attempts, with ascent on colouir running the base in the center left of the photo, then along the ridge up to the summit.

The exceptional images of the drone piloted by Bartek Bargiel, brother of mountaineer Andzrej (engaged in the attempt to climb the K2 and subsequent descent with ski), which show Rick Allen on Broad Peak, reported missing and probably died as a result of non-return from his solitary summit attempt.
Rick Allen, a very tough Scottish hide, had fallen for a few hundred meters, fortunately without serious injuries, but had found himself out.
Thanks to the help of the drone (and the cook of the expedition, the first to have spotted his backpack with the Camp Base telescope) the rescuers happily met and helped get off Rick, then evacuated by helicopter.

The brutality of the events on the Nanga Parbat, the frenetic development of the Rescue Mission, solidarity and crowdfunding on Social and the contemporary wave of controversy over the meanings of these expedition, the accusations and poisoned doubts, about everything, from rescue bills, to rescue strategy, helicopter flights , corrupted governments and so on.

The Epic of Survival and the tragic choices, the extraordinary nature of human and mountaineering performances, the emotion and the joy for an incredible rescue.

The pain for the death of Tomek Mackiewitz, so tragic and at the same time already in process of elaboration and transfiguration, the collective process of sudden realization of his extraordinary, complex and contradictory figure and yet so pure and spiritual, his obsession and of his dream, light and innovative, ascetic, insane.

“The Keeper of the Nanga”, now they call him: no longer the madman, the drug addict, the ill-advised.

Respect and admiration for a woman like Elizabeth Revol, able to bear a gigantic burden of responsibility, attached to life with an unshakeable, dignified and standing determination, refusing crutches, before being taken to the hospital. Now she will have to face the harsh physical and psychic consequences of an adventure at the limits of human endurance, and she is already harassed,through her pages on Facebook by improvised judges on the media, who demand explanations and proofs.

The hypocrisy and ignorance of those who scream anger because no one wanted to save Tomek, here I think these thoughts offend his own Memory. Tomek knew perfectly what he did and what he risked. In the previous six times he tried his dream on Nanga Parbat, he had always shown that he knew when it was time to return to the Base, not to risk his life unnecessarily. He loved his children and his wife madly, he wanted to go back home. But he wanted badly to go there.

From what we know, hestarted to get sick at the top, at 8126 meters. When Elizabeth left her, the next morning, after a bivouac outside at 7500 meters and a desperate descent to 7200 meters, he was no longer able to move, to see and frostbites were serious. Although he was a man of extraordinary resistance, we know from the medical literature and from previous incidents, that within 48 hours death is certain, in case of cerebral edema, if you are not cured and taken immediately to a low altitude.

We could can talk in the future, and it will happen, on how well they were acclimatized, on the fact that the window of good weather was too small, that they attacked the summit from too far.

Sometimes it’s just damned bad luck, because Elizabeth not only did not have problems, but survived the following days in inhumane and deadly conditions.

Tomek Mackiewitz and Elizabeth Revol have opened and completed, in alpine style, the route started by Messner and Eisendle on the extreme side of Diamir Face, arrived at the saddle at 7500 meters on the Basin, they went down in front of the summit trapezoid, crossing the Kinshofer route , then they climbed at the top .

From now on, we will talk about the Mackiewitz-Revol route and one of the first winter in pure alpine style.

The Poles and the Rescue. We do not have to spend too many words, as Wielicki pointed out. “We did what we had to do”. They have saved a human life and have greatly ennobled the spirit of the true mountaineering community, the Brotherhood of Rope. Where a great human named Denis Urubko , Russian, then a Kazakh national, then a little Italian from Bergamo, then a Polish national, ran to meet a Frenchwoman, finding her in the dark of the wall and greeting her in English “Elizabeth! Nice to meet you”